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Google’s new Chinese name

Google has rebranded itself in China, and the company took the opportunity to …

Google has a new name—at least in China. At a Beijing ceremony, the company announced that it would be known in China as "Gu Ge," or "harvest song." What does "harvest song" have to do with search results? The new name is intended to give "the sense of a fruitful and productive search experience, in a poetic Chinese way." Obviously. Google's English name, if transliterated into Chinese, means "old hound," so it doesn't take a marketing genius to see why the company felt it needed a new identity.

At the event, Google CEO Eric Schmidt also defended his company's decision to censor search results in China, arguing once again that Google needs to obey local laws and that it is better for Western companies to engage with China than to remain aloof.

"From our perspective, we must comply with the local law, and indeed, we have all made commitments to the government that we will absolutely follow Chinese law," he said. "We don't have an alternative and the Chinese law does prohibit certain information. We made the decision to go ahead and implement those prohibitions because we have to implement local law and it is in that spirit that we have entered the China market in order to serve the end-users."

Organizations like Reporters Without Borders have argued that Google should not aid the Chinese government by censoring searches. The implication is that Western companies should wait to enter the Chinese market until that market plays by Western norms. Some have even suggested that Google immediately try to throw its weight around with the Chinese government in an attempt to get them to left the censorship requirements. Schmidt doesn't think this is an appropriate way to move forward.

"That would be arrogant for a newcomer, which is what Google is," he said.

Is Google getting a bad rap for its China policies? After all, it's not the only American company that obeys Chinese law, but it is regularly singled out for more criticism than some rival firms, such as Cisco, Yahoo, and Microsoft. But that's apparently what happens when you very publicly declare your desire not to "be evil."